Alexis Goldstein, Senior Policy Analyst at Americans for Financial Reform, issued this statement about the nomination of Betsy DeVos as Education Secretary:

“Americans for Financial Reform is gravely concerned with Education Secretary nominee Betsy DeVos’ refusal to commit to enforcing federal rules that prevent fraud and abuse in higher education in yesterday’s confirmation hearing. For too long, taxpayers have paid for billions of dollars in federal grant and loan money to flow to predatory for-profit schools that scammed their students and broke the law. In the 2014-2015 school year alone, for-profit colleges received $16.4 billion in federal student loan money in federal student loan money. As noted by the 2012 report by Senator Harkin, for-profit colleges spend on advertising than instruction. Nowhere is that clearer than at Corinthian, a school that defrauded hundreds of thousands of students and was still paying millions for ads on cable TV and internet advertisements even as it was collapsing.

It is crucial that any nominee for Education Secretary of the Department of Education not only affirm the need to enforce existing rules that seek to protect both students and taxpayers from fraud, but also clearly articulate plans to rapidly pursue additional automatic group discharges. Betsy DeVos has done neither. Americans for Financial Reform urges the members of the Senate to reject Betsy DeVos’s nomination as Secretary of the Department of Education.”